Report: Canaan Will Be Listed Publicly in the US in November

Canaan Creative, one of the world’s largest bitcoin mining machine manufacturers, will be listed as a publicly traded company in the U.S. in November 2019, according to a source with knowledge of the matter.

According to the source, the Avalon miner producer, which has a valuation of $1.5 billion, is issuing 126 million shares in its company, which will be closed on October 20, 2019. 8btc reached out to Canaan but the company refused to comment.

In July 2019, Canaan reportedly filed an application for an initial public offering (IPO) with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). People close to the company told 8btc that the company had recently finished all of the procedures of an IPO and that its valuation would be in the range of $2 billion to $3 billion, depending on the specific inquiry results of investment institutions.

If that valuation is confirmed, the company’s three-year efforts in seeking public investment will finally pay off and make it the first of China’s “big three” mining machine giants (Bitmain, Canaan and Ebang) to go public in the traditional capital market.

Kong Jianping, co-lead director of Canaan, said weeks ago that the SEC has a very good understanding of blockchain technology and cryptocurrency and that it is possible for compliant companies working in this area to go public on U.S. soil.

Prior to Canaan’s filing with the SEC, Bitmain, Canaan and Ebang had all failed in IPO attempts in Hong Kong. The trio’s U.S. IPO plans come as these bitcoin miner mega-sellers report soaring demand for cryptocurrency mining machines in 2019.

Chen Feng, Canaan’s sales director, disclosed to 8btc that it had received letters of intent demanding 500,000 units of its latest A10 and A11 miners and that the number was expected to surpass 1 million in 2020.

Founded in 2013, Hangzhou-based Canaan is known for producing China’s first bitcoin mining machine — the Avalon miner, which features customized, super-fast ASIC chips and marked the end of personal-computer–based mining.

According to the financial figures included in its Hong Kong IPO filing, the gross profit of Canaan for 2015, 2016 and 2017 were 13.88 million yuan (roughly $2 million), 132 million yuan ($19 million) and 604 million yuan ($88 million), respectively.

In 2017, the company shipped an estimated 294,500 bitcoin mining machines worldwide, accounting for 20.9 percent of the global market share. Producing 19.5 percent of the global hash rate, it has become the world’s second-largest producer of cryptocurrency miners.

In 2018, the company announced the launch of the world’s first 7nm bitcoin ASIC and racked in over 4 billion yuan ($561 million) in miner sales during 2018, according to Shao Jianliang, head of blockchain business at Canaan.

Canaan’s road to an IPO has been full of twists and turns. The company had tried to list on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange via a backdoor listing in 2016, but the plan was canceled after failing to satisfy regulatory requirements. In August 2017, the company submitted a listing application to NEEQ, but ultimately it retreated from the domestic market under an unfriendly policy environment in March 2018. In May 2019, Canaan made a comeback targeting the Hong Kong market, but it let its IPO application lapse six months later.